Diphtheria and tetanus seroepidemiology among children in Ukraine, 2017.

Background: The drastic decline of Ukraine's immunization coverage since 2009 led to concerns about potential resurgence diphtheria and tetanus, along with other vaccine-preventable diseases.

Methods: To assess population immunity against diphtheria and tetanus, we tested specimens from the serosurvey conducted in 2017 among children born in 2006-2015, the birth cohorts targeted by the nationwide outbreak response immunization following a circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus type 1 outbreak in Zakarpattya province in 2015. We surveyed four regions of Ukraine, using cluster sampling in Zakarpattya, Sumy, and Odessa provinces and simple random sampling in Kyiv City.

Rapid risk assessment during the early weeks of the 2015-2016 influenza season in Ukraine.

Background: Several eastern European countries reported a severe influenza season to the World Health Organization (WHO) during late 2015. A country-specific rapid risk assessment for Ukraine was conducted to assess the season's severity and inform public health action.

Methods: The exposure and hazard were assessed using acute respiratory infection (ARI), severe acute respiratory infection (SARI), laboratory surveillance, virological and vaccine data from weeks 40/2015 to 7/2016 with comparison to 4 previous seasons to describe the influenza season start (5-week consecutive increase in ARI or SARI), predominant virus types, geographical spread and affected age groups.